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Aeonsgate main man Jondix may be more known for his tattoos than for his music, but as a sideline to the art of ink he has regularly fronted heavy bands with more than a slant towards doom. Aeonsgate is his new project and through it he has gathered a collective of musicians from around the globe to fulfil his ambition of creating a singular piece which trawls across a whole album.
Pentalpha is an hour long piece which encompasses all the tropes of the doom genre and for the most part is really quite enjoyable. Prone to flights of fancy as anything of this stature would be, Jondix does a good job of keeping things relatively straight throughout.
Not that you would think this from the rather silly introduction which is in the form of a poem and only makes sense once you slip into some sort of Edgar Allen Poe mindset. Once you do this though, you are then able to slip inside the story being told and can start enjoying yourself.
Long winded and confusing, you’ll be hard pushed to follow proceedings but in parts you will recognise a thread starting to permeate through. Madness, the devil and science combine to bring the horror to life and the over riding theme of exploration does have its rewards. A rather splendid lyric of “galaxies swirling in my mind” serves as the apex of the piece and offers a mind bending outlook on life
Musically it is highly competent and amongst the myriad guitar solos and tremendous drumming the piece never becomes boring and is always willing to offer something different. Mixing in classic doom with some more heavy metal traits works well and can be looked upon with some praise.
Whether you would want to go through it all again depends in your penchant for this type of thing. You need to find the time to sit and listen to the whole story. There is no quick hit and it may appear that Jondix is intent on creating a piece of art rather than music. It’s testament to his vigour that he very nearly pulls it off.
